To ask what's an adult problem that nobody prepared you for?

[Midge1978]

For me it's keeping the bathroom clean. I don't think I ever saw my mother clean hers but it was always immaculate and rosey smelling. I can't seem to keep on top of the mould monster in mine!

Threadworms

A lot of the stuff didn't come as a shock to me in adulthood. My childhood was not that great, and had to have lots of responsibility from early on, and also help in at-home care work. I knew all the mundane household maintenance, how fucking expensive and relentless stuff is, and that people are a bit shit, and that grown ups are winging it (and don't always get mature with age). Even my chronic pain issues started as a teenager.

I wasn't expecting how little control I'd have of the very major decisions in my life. Infertility was the first main punch in the gut. No amount of trying more and somehow being better would get me over that failing of biology.

The second was mental health. I thought that once I was out of a bad environment, my anxieties, panics and other issues would somehow miraculously solve themselves. Instead I had a breakdown in my mid-20s that landed me on a psych ward, and from which I'm still not fully over twelve years later. In fact I'm now facing the idea that I'll never be "normal" with my mental health at all, and will only function while building my life to suit my limitations.

Ooh, I want to add something positive!

I thought adult friendships and romantic relationships were always a bit shit, a bit shallow, unstable and generally not something I'd ever want to involve myself in.

It's come as a lovely surprise that you can have a nice, stable marriage without constant rows, being mean to each other, trying to "win" over each other, or generally being shits towards each. Who knew?! And while it's harder to find friends as an adult, it's possible, and you can choose to hang out with nice people who respect your boundaries.

For me it's just the amount of shit to do!

Having a child that isn't "good" at school. I find it really awful - he has ASD so I'm coming to understand why he struggles and why he behaves the way he does and support him. However i find all the dealings with school and all the horrible judgement from friends and family really overwhelming.

Also dealing with tradespeople!

The hardship of getting up early everyday.

So many of these.
Never feeling like an adult, then realising how I would have seen myself 20 years ago.. as the old, sensible one in the corner. Who is she??

Yy to cleaning, meals, appts, everything all the time. Being the keeper of all the thinking, for everyone.

And the realisation that there are no behaviour rules when you are a “grown up” and if there were, some adults wouldn’t follow them. Some people are just bastards and don’t care. Still baffles me.

The fact that life isn’t fair.

Good, decent, conscientious, kind, honourable people often get nowhere. Rude, obnoxious, arrogant, useless, ruthless people often prosper.

Class privilege is still so important in so many professions. If you didn’t go to public school and Oxbridge and your father wasn’t ‘somebody’ , many doors, career paths and networks will remain permanently closed to you and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.

Marriage

Chronic pain, and illness.

How disempowering it would all feel - even if you have knowledge and opinions, changing things seems impossible.

Dealing with elderly parents. The guilt and the drain of it all.

mollyblack I wasn’t prepared for this either.xx

The constant drip-drip-drip of money throughout the month, something every single day. If everything just got paid in one go it would be so much easier!

Also norovirus- when you're lay on the bathroom floor feeling like you might die and you hear your child throwing up in their bed.

As Jsmith99 says "Good, decent, conscientious,kind honourable people often get nowhere. Rude, obnoxious, arrogant, useless, ruthless people often prosper."
That !
So true.
I find that so difficult to accept.

Bean and jsmith
I hear and agree with what your saying about bad people that prosper, I like to think that karma hits them eventually, I think Karma happens in a specific way that Leads people to be better people. I will get ready for the onslaught by that comment 🙄 But does anyone agree/see where I'm coming from?

I basically brought myself up due to having reasonably neglectful parents. However I think it did me well as I’m always willing to give things a go myself and I’m fiercely independent too.

I wish someone had taught me how to be financially responsible instead of being frivolous.
It took me until at least my late 20s to realise I didn’t have to put up with toxic people in my life. I wish someone had told me I didn’t have to put up with it for so long

I do believe in Karma, but I also agree that the selfish greedy downright nasty people you meet in life sometimes seem to have a much more charmed time of it.
Even ones that are just selfish or look after number one seem to get on in life as they tend to be headstrong and not worried about other people, do things regardless without thinking of the reasons not to do something. Lack empathy.
I was brought up differently and always worry about other people. I find this hard and I'm sure it stops me doing lots of things.

Very much so, bakebeans...as an adult i’m much more aware of the low points in my parents’ marriage.
But they still made it ‘look easy’.

My older brother and i are both married with children and neither of us are particularly happy - which is no way to live, really.

My own situation wouldn’t be quite so hard to bear, if it weren’t for the fact that my ex-bf and i are still in love with one other.
He realised too late...but we’re both married with children now and the thought of breaking up 2 families genuinely gives me a pain in the chest.
We love our children more, is the bottom line.

My parents are both dead and im on my own with 3 kids....i sometimes wake up at night and terrify myself with thoughts that if i got sick there is no safety net around me...if i couldnt work id lose my house etc.....there is no one else on this earth who loves me and would look after me...just my kids.

The amount of decisions you have to make and stuff you have to deal with.
That being old is not always a good thing. It just means all your close friends and family die before you - not me but saw this happen to a very elderly relative. Kind of put me off wanting to live to a very old age. I don't think I want to cope with so much bereavement.

How much joy my children would bring me as adults.

How bereft I feel as a grown woman since Mum and Dad died

I wasn't really prepared for any of the grownup stuff starting from having to save up for your own house to having children. Yes, of course, you hear your parents say stuff like "Oh you will understand when you are an adult.... " but, of course, you only really do understand when you are an adult!

There are, however, some things my mother did that I still don't understand despite the fact that she said many times that I would :)

Dealing with back chatting, rude and snide family members.

How to get rid off the pile of washed clothes and unwashed at the same time. There is always bloody something to wash/put away.

How not to give a fuck about what people think all the time.

That it doesn't matter how much you contort yourself to the wishes and expectations of others, someone, somewhere will still disapprove of you and find you sub-human.

Ultimately, you should do what pleases you or harms you least as long as it doesn't harm others or create chaos further down the line.